MessiahCarey wrote: If you were killed with a gun, and then you came back 2000 years later only to find that everyone was wearing gold-plated guns around their necks as status symbols, how would you feel about it?

Apply the same ethic to crosses. ;-)

Peace,
Shane

^ KRS "The truth" said exactly the same thing (but Youd prolly know that)...
The Cross is the ultimate symbol of Idolitry, and it is Written as one of the 10 commandments, not to worship Idols, Therefore it is an abomination to the GOD of the Torah (Which Funny enough is the GOD that most Christians Worship without realising "hashem" [the name].. The TETRAGRAMATON)...

Ultimately all things (all things appart from the Spirit) are of the material world, so therefore anything of the material world is a form of Idolitry.... Even the Bible.... We cant forget the Bible was written By Man, and We must Remember that Man is Weak, easily tempted.... easily Persuaded... By Evil... Energy or Entity... Whatever Your comfortable with, it clearly exists.... The Bible and all books of Spiritual Philosophy have been altered From their Original Essense... And when somethin is altered from the Original it loses power and Original Meaning... I was bought up with Christianity and I do Believe that there is Truth in the Book (Its got a lot of Stories in it that Relate to Life, even in this age), but I also Believe if You Really want to understand and Read it for its Purity, You gotta Learn Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.... So much is lost and Altered When You Translate a Holy Scripture... The original is always The Realest.....

But all Spiritual books were still Written By Man, And I Dont Trust Man.... I believe the Same Crews in World Power back Then are the same Crews in World Power now... Just different Generations... Satan is the GOD of The Material world ... Its Clear aint it? Ask Albert Pike...

I believe all Spiritual Philosophies have Been put here for a reason.... and to know them all is to have some Idea of What or Who GOD is..... Our thoughts Manifest our reality so... If You dont Believe in GOD, GOD wont exist in Your World... Because You dont allow GOD to exist.... But on the other hand if You do Believe in GOD, The Divine Energy is forever present, and unexplainable things happen....

Ultimately I am Struggling to believe solely In One Religion but... I believe if You Project Love, Peace, goodwill, and Understanding for Your fellow Beings, The True GOD will Guide You, towards the right path regardles of what any fundamentalist believes...

$$$$.... Its the Root of all Evil So Technically.... Where all Satanists.... WORD!!

Thu Dec 05, 2002 5:37 am

SoundDoctrine

Joined: 20 Nov 2002
Posts: 423
Location: Nomad

To those speaking of LOGIC and CONCRETE ideas...

It is called your FAITH for a reason...Being certain in what we do not see...Do I know EVERYTHING about God's existance, the creation, my temptations, why God lets certain things happen? NO...Put where I cannot get from the Bible or totally comprehend faith into place that I am taken care of by my creator...Now faith is not an excuse to not grow spiritually, but a means of placing convictions and beliefs in the harder to understand areas of my life IE: House burning down example...A logical person would think selfishly and in the moment and think "If God is so real why did he do this to me." One with FAITH..."What better does God have in store for me, what lesson is do be learned."...A large reason athiests and non-believers cannot grasp christianity (And when I say Christianity, in it's pure form, not with false doctrines of churches and man...But in the form it was meant to be in...Pure...) Is because they lack discipline in the area of placing trust in a higher being...Better yet they lack the ability to place something "higher" than themselves...Believing that everything must be answered to them instead of how they may have to answer to God...Is EVERYONE going to become a christian...No...But logical reasoning is not a good enough reason NOT to choose a FAITH...Everything cannot be answered for us mere humans...We are just that, made of dust...HAVE FAITH...

Hebrews 11:1 - "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

Thu Dec 05, 2002 6:39 am

MessiahCarey

Joined: 01 Jul 2002
Posts: 10924

Petrouchka Rasputin wrote: I'm surprised there aren't more agnostics.

I guess most people like to believe something, one way or the other.

We seem to be agreeing a lot these days...haha.

Thu Dec 05, 2002 9:19 am

MessiahCarey

Joined: 01 Jul 2002
Posts: 10924

Re: ... GOD...

Solomon Klepto wrote:
Ultimately I am Struggling to believe solely In One Religion but... I believe if You Project Love, Peace, goodwill, and Understanding for Your fellow Beings, The True GOD will Guide You, towards the right path regardles of what any fundamentalist believes...

That is a fucking dope attitude - and the one that religions are SUPPOSED to teach.

I hear you...it's just as arrogant to say it COULDN'T be a possibility as it is to assume it's the truth (in my opinion).

Peace,
Shane

Thu Dec 05, 2002 9:21 am

MessiahCarey

Joined: 01 Jul 2002
Posts: 10924

SoundDoctrine wrote: To those speaking of LOGIC and CONCRETE ideas...

It is called your FAITH for a reason...Being certain in what we do not see...Do I know EVERYTHING about God's existance, the creation, my temptations, why God lets certain things happen? NO...Put where I cannot get from the Bible or totally comprehend faith into place that I am taken care of by my creator...Now faith is not an excuse to not grow spiritually, but a means of placing convictions and beliefs in the harder to understand areas of my life IE: House burning down example...A logical person would think selfishly and in the moment and think "If God is so real why did he do this to me." One with FAITH..."What better does God have in store for me, what lesson is do be learned."...A large reason athiests and non-believers cannot grasp christianity (And when I say Christianity, in it's pure form, not with false doctrines of churches and man...But in the form it was meant to be in...Pure...) Is because they lack discipline in the area of placing trust in a higher being...Better yet they lack the ability to place something "higher" than themselves...Believing that everything must be answered to them instead of how they may have to answer to God...Is EVERYONE going to become a christian...No...But logical reasoning is not a good enough reason NOT to choose a FAITH...Everything cannot be answered for us mere humans...We are just that, made of dust...HAVE FAITH...

Hebrews 11:1 - "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

Man.

I'm not going to even get into the faith vs. inference argument - but I recommend that anyone who wishes to debate religious ideas, from EITHER side of the spectrum, pick up the "Atheist Debaters Handbook" as it describes how you can avoid some of the pitfalls in the argument you presented above. This is just not something I want to get into, because it breeds resentment - I'm happy just saying "I disagree" smiling and moving on with this one. ;-)

And that Hebrews 11:1 quote taken out of context as you just did, beleive it or not, makes it LESS beleivable than leaving it in with the 11:2 and 11:3 as well:

"Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible."

This is a little more beleivable because it basically says "Well...if we don't know where it came from, blame it on God because we don't know where he came from either!" Heh.

One thing I want to point out, though:

SoundDoctrine wrote:
One with FAITH..."What better does God have in store for me, what lesson is do be learned."

This is my attitude, even as an atheist (yes, I'm agnostic, but if I don't base my life on God's law I may as well be an atheist to beleivers). Not "what the fuck, now my house is gone and I have to blame it on someone", but my attitude is more along the lines of "oh...what next? How am I going to not only recover from this but also move on to a better situation." I just don't use religion to make it happen - I use my own desire to survive.

Peace,
Shane

Thu Dec 05, 2002 9:32 am

SoundDoctrine

Joined: 20 Nov 2002
Posts: 423
Location: Nomad

My point is...Believe what you want to believe...That Hebrews scripture 1,2, and 3 talks about faith being something you need when you don't necessarily have the answer...There was nothing being taken out of context...MY FAITH (Being sure of what I have not seen) is what lets me continue to believe that the bible is MY SOURCE OF TRUTH...I did not see the authors write it...I did not see "holy ones" translate it...But my FAITH covers over what I can't depict...I have conviction (unmovable belief) that the scripture is God-breathed and he would not let it be altered...I respect all of you, I really do...I just don't like when people use all these examples of what they believe religion to be and not to be...Yet they can't go on one side of the fense...It is light and dark...There is no inbetween...CHOOSE...Sitting on the fense doesn't get you to the other side yet...That's where your FAITH is going to have to step in...Again...Being sure of what you cannot see...We as humans feel the need to reason too much sometimes about things that will NEVER be prooven until the end of the age...Wether I'm right or wrong (of course I think I'm right) I have chosen a side and I'm stickin' to it...You cats can keep listening to "Divine Disappointment" and stay in the middle...Make a choice...

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:22 am

SoundDoctrine

Joined: 20 Nov 2002
Posts: 423
Location: Nomad

By the way...

This thread makes me think of MC Escher...He was always drawing himself in a reflection of a sphere...He said it was a reflection of human ego...No matter what position...We always see ourselves in the middle...Everyting around us and us in the center...Everything rotating around us...In fact we rotate around the creator, wether you know it or not...

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:24 am

darianluv

Joined: 08 Oct 2002
Posts: 350

At one point I would've considered myself an atheist, but now if i were to catergorize myself I'd call myself a deist.

In all probability a 'god' does exist, or at least some kind of higher power, according to einstein.

I don't want to get into it, but i think people get a distorted view of what god is, but its possible to put a more practical face to it.

You are REALLY going to ride your lifestyle on a MAN'S scientific findings?
That sounds so foolish to me...

You are never going to find ALL the answers to how to live life...Never...

So you will ride the fence...

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:34 am

MessiahCarey

Joined: 01 Jul 2002
Posts: 10924

darianluv wrote: At one point I would've considered myself an atheist, but now if i were to catergorize myself I'd call myself a deist.

In all probability a 'god' does exist, or at least some kind of higher power, according to einstein.

I don't want to get into it, but i think people get a distorted view of what god is, but its possible to put a more practical face to it.

Most of the forefathers were deists, as a side note.

Your beleif also includes that, regardless of that higher power existing, he does not affect every day life, am I wrong? That's just what I've been told "deists" beleive - am I missing something?

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:39 am

SoundDoctrine

Joined: 20 Nov 2002
Posts: 423
Location: Nomad

Oh and about the crosses...

It's funny because the cross everyone sports around thier neck while rappin' about killin'...Isn't even the type of cross Jesus was nailed to...

The cross that we see everyday the one that looks like a "t" with the curl off the bottom is the Spanish cross...The TRUE cross of Jesus' roman period actually looked like a "T"...That's how he carried it on his back...The top part of it actually rested on a large pole in the ground...He didn't carry the whole pole...

So everytime you see the "t" cross, you can know that them cats is stupid anyway...

Just thought I'd let you know

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:44 am

darianluv

Joined: 08 Oct 2002
Posts: 350

SoundDoctrine wrote:
You are REALLY going to ride your lifestyle on a MAN'S scientific findings?
That sounds so foolish to me...

no... but why not, when compared to man's philosophies.

That sounds foolish because the idea of god came from man as well.

I don't like the idea of blindly following ANYTHING, call it faith, or patriotism or whatever.

I'll follow what seems right to me.

Thu Dec 05, 2002 10:51 am

darianluv

Joined: 08 Oct 2002
Posts: 350

MessiahCarey wrote:

Most of the forefathers were deists, as a side note.

Your beleif also includes that, regardless of that higher power existing, he does not affect every day life, am I wrong? That's just what I've been told "deists" beleive - am I missing something?

I know a few forefathers were deist, but weren't most of them protestant or puritan?

there are five articles that pretty much sum it up- (1) a belief in the existence of the Deity, (2) the obligation to reverence such a power, (3) the identification of worship with practical morality, (4) the obligation to repent of sin and to abandon it, and, (5) divine recompense in this world and the next.

I'm not a real deist, a lot of theologies branched off.

The reason I'd see myself as a deist is the idea of a natural religion, and the idea of some form of a higher power. I'm not atheist, but don't follow any religions, that to me is deism.

Thu Dec 05, 2002 11:06 am

SoundDoctrine

Joined: 20 Nov 2002
Posts: 423
Location: Nomad

"I'm not atheist, but don't follow any religions, that to me is deism."